Double duty: Some grandparents play dual role, raising their grandchildren - Fall River Herald News

Taking kids to the zoo, stoping for ice cream and playing in a park. They’re all part of the fun of being a grandparent. But for many grandparents, grandkids are parenting, round two.

After raising their own kids and looking forward to the easy years of retirement, many grandparents find themselves in the emotionally and financially challenging position of starting all over again. This time, raising their grandchildren.

According to the most recent U.S. Census Bureau statistics, 2.7 million grandparents were responsible for providing food, clothing and a place to live for one or more grandchildren. Of these caregivers, 1.7 million were grandmothers, and 1 million were grandfathers; 1.6 million were still working.

It’s an issue Brenda Grace knows all too well. And it’s one that prompted the New Bedford grandmother into a role she’d never imagined: Becoming an advocate and support for other grandparents in the same position.

Shortly after taking in her own two granddaughters, who at the time were ages 12 and 14, Grace learned firsthand about the lack of resources and clear-cut information available to grandparents raising their grandchildren. So she decided to do something about it.

Two months later, in 2006, she formed a nonprofit support group, Grandparents Raising Grandchildren, to help other grandparents tackling the same issues. She also met with officials from the Department of Children and Families to discuss issues specific to grandparents, and in the process, she ended up being part of a Commission on the Status of Grandparents that produced a comprehensive booklet outlining resources available to grandparents raising their grandchildren.

The main issue, she said, is the lack of financial assistance available to grandparents who become legal guardians of their grandchildren. At the time, Grace, who works full-time, said she received less than a total of $500 a month through the Department of Transitional Assistance to care for and feed the two girls.

Grace decided to take the girls away from her daughter, who at the time was battling heroin and alcohol addiction, by obtaining guardianship through the probate court. Her daughter agreed to the arrangement, so it was a relatively simple one-day process. She also never stopped her daughter from seeing her grandchildren. “We’re a very close-knit family. When she was straight, I let her see the kids,” said Grace, who had already raised four children of her own.

By contrast, if the children had been in DCF custody (due to a determination of abuse or neglect) and Grace had been named kinship foster parent, she said she would have received twice as much money, and a clothing allowance.

But Grace said she didn’t want to involve DCF, so she took the financial hit. It’s a choice, she said, that many of the grandparents in her support group take, making do with less and trying to make ends meet while taking responsibility for their family members.

“I made too much money so we couldn’t get Food Stamps. I did it myself with the help of God. They turned out pretty good ... we lived, we ate,” she said.

Cancer and adolescent girls all at once
But it wasn’t easy. At the time, her husband was out of work battling colon cancer. She had the added stress of constantly worrying if the sirens she heard on her street were headed to her drug-addicted daughter’s nearby house.

And, of course, she also had the care of two adolescent granddaughters â€" one quiet, and the other giving her “a hard time every step of the way.” Grace said the younger granddaughter ran away once and was gone for two weeks before turning herself in. “She wanted to do what she wanted to do, but I wouldn’t let her,” said Grace.

After Grace cared for the two teens for six years, her daughter finally straightened her life out and has been sober for three years. The younger granddaughter, 18, lives with the mother and is heading to community college. The older daughter, 21, is going to nursing school and working as well.

“It’s hard. It changes your life. It’s like bringing up your own kids all over again,” said Grace.

Fall River grandmother also an advocate
The financial difficulties for grandparents raising their grandchildren is an issue that Fall River resident Lorraine DaPonte faced first-hand years earlier. In 1989, DaPonte took over guardianship of her two grandchildren, Jason, 8, and Nicholas, 3, when her daughter was in the depths of alcohol and heroin addiction.

Times were already tough even before becoming their legal guardian. In 1987, DaPonte lost her husband in an accident and later that year, her house was nearly destroyed by fire. She was also battling breast cancer and the heartbreak of seeing her daughter’s disintegration into the world of drugs.

Like Grace, DaPonte wanted grandparents raising their grandchildren to receive the same type of financial assistance that foster parents earned. At the time, she received $450 in public assistance to care for the two young boys. And like Grace, DaPonte formed a support group for the many grandparents she encountered who were in her situation. They also took the issue to the national stage in the early 1990s in with an appearance on Geraldo Riveira’s talk show.

After the television appearance, she said, she received 5,000 calls from grandparents all over the country looking for advice and assistance. “It was unbelievable. I was getting calls from all over: New Mexico, Hawaii.”

The support group also worked on a bill with former legislator and Fall River Mayor Edward Lambert, to get grandparents the same rights as foster parents. “But it never passed,” said DaPonte.

Years of difficulties followed for DaPonte, now 79. Her daughter, now 56 and partially blind, is still, according to DaPonte, battling the addictions that brought her in and out of her children’s lives for years. The daughter had a third son, Tyler, who DaPonte also raised. And she lost her oldest grandson, Jason, in a car accident several years ago.
The sadness of losing her grandson, and the fatigue of raising a second family, led to the support group disbanding over time, but DaPonte is still willing to offer her support and advice to others.

And despite the hardships over the years, DaPonte has close relationships with both grandsons, Nicholas, 25, and Tyler, 17. “I’m proud of them. I have no regrets,” she said.

Grandparents Raising Grandchildren
Grace continues the work to help others through the Grandparents Raising Grandchildren support group, which meets once a month at the New Bedford City Hall. The resources grandparents are looking for, she said, are same ones she sought: “They’re looking for money. They’re wondering how long they’re going to have their grandkids. They’re working and dealing with daycare. Some of them are grandmothers on Social Security,” said Grace.

Like Grace, many of the 17 grandparents in the group became guardians of their grandchildren because their children were battling drug and alcohol addictions. Others, she said, have children who are incarcerated or who died. “Whatever I can do to help them, I’m there,” said Grace, who at 67 still works full-time. She also plans to work with area politicians on a bill for grandparents’ rights and open more support groups in area cities and towns.

Grandparents Raising Grandchildren, funded through the United Way and Coastal Elderly Services, is open to all grandparents from area cities and towns. In addition to helping with resources, they also have guest speakers such as attorneys, and sometimes, they just get together to have fun.

They recently held a family day at Buttonwood Park Zoo for grandparents and grandchildren and anyone else who stopped by to enjoy a free hot dog or hamburger. And today, on Grandparent’s Day, they’re holding a grandparents’ tea. “We try to make it fun. There’s so many negatives, we try to look at the flip side; we want to make it positive, not negative,” she said.

Grandparents find emotional support
The support that these grandparents find through a support group is often helping each other with the emotional aspects of their situations, said Mary Whittaker, retired principal of the McCarrick School, who as a social worker ran a support group for grandparents at Family Services from 1989 to 1990. “The support they gave each other was phenomenal. At the time, it was a relatively new phenomenon â€" grandparents raising their grandchildren, and they were very supportive of each other,” she said.
Some, she said, were the parent of kids who had gotten into trouble and had their kids taken away from them. “They were babies who had babies and the grandparents, out of love and necessity, stepped in. But it was very hard for them. They were the unsung heroines â€" and I say ‘heroines’ because it was mostly women,” she said.

In addition to caring for their grandchildren, many of the grandparents in the group were also caring for their aging parents. “They were tired. They’d already done it once and some of them were looking at forever because the parents were incarcerated or had died,” said Whittaker.

The Grandparents Raising Grandchildren support group meets on the third Tuesday of every month from 6 to 8 p.m. at the New Bedford City Hall, 133 Williams St., New Bedford. Grace welcomes grandparents from all SouthCoast cities and towns to join the confidential meetings.

Email Linda Murphy at lmurphy@heraldnews.com

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